


Waiting in Slow Motion

by fupette



Category: Yellowstone (TV 2018)
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Pre-Relationship, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:53:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28479483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fupette/pseuds/fupette
Summary: Rip invites Beth out for a meal, on her return to Montana (Season 1 timeframe)
Relationships: Beth Dutton/Rip Wheeler
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> English is my first language, all spellings and grammar issues are my own. One pretty innocuous swear word used, nothing gratuitous.
> 
> Roll on Season 4!

Rip is a patient man, he has always loved Beth, it was no revelation to him; he had come to this acceptance long ago. He knew it from the first time they spoke to each other. Even though she tore in and out of his life with the destructive tendency of a tornado, for the past fifteen years he has seen her in stolen snatches, when she visits her family at the ranch; quick affairs mainly around John Dutton's birthday and sometimes randomly on Thanksgiving or Christmas. Sure he'd enjoy the wild sex, the odd assortment of one night stands, stacked up like a litany of inevitabilities whenever Beth was in town. He can tell this time is different, at her father's behest she is staying or at the very least has condescended not to runaway again. He hoped she might stick around for him, but family duty is one of her fundamental lodestars, if she had promised her father she would stay, he knew she'd remain true to her word. 

Rip wants to move beyond their cycle of trysts, the sex was mind-blowing but ultimately Rip longed for the emotional connection they shared in their youth. He uses his own father as a benchmark of what not to do, he wants to shower Beth in the affection he knows his mother was starved of. As delectable as the object of his affections was, he wanted more than physical intimacy, he wished that he could show Beth how much she meant to him, he knew behind her tough outer exterior beneath her bravado was a love-starved woman.

"A date?" Beth's confusion is plain from her rhetorical question, echoing Rip's polite invitation for dinner and a concert. He felt vaguely sad that Beth would treat his suggestion as if it was an absurd notion. "Christ, Rip why can't we just fuck like normal people? I never took you for being a pussy for pointless foreplay". Rip would have preferred to give her the simple and true explanation, he loved her and wanted to show her. It hurt him to think that Beth considered herself unworthy of love or public displays of affection. 

He caught Beth in a hug, hoping to stall her melodramatic attempt to storm out of the room. He was always more a physical reaction guy, not a thinker or a talker.  
He let his lips burrow through her hair allowing him proximity to her earlobe, in a low rumbled whisper he rattles off his inalienable facts "You are an amazing person, Beth. You have lit up my life the moment I first laid eyes on you". He can see that she has clenched her jaw, as if she is minded to argue against the compliments. "You are kind, smart and beautiful". He places a chaste kiss full on the lips, hoping their eye-contact will allow her to see the sincerity of his words. His kiss has stopped her from deploying her razor-sharp wit, against his plainspoken words. "You make me a better man, you make me want to be the best man I can be, for you".

It takes a long moment for Beth to find her voice biting her lower lip nervously, "Stop Rip, you know we can't... you must have realised by now that I'm no good, I don't want to hurt you, please!". The words left Beth's morose mouth with a finality and certainty as if she was reciting rote facts, "I'm a bitch, I make bad decisions...I can't be trusted. I'm careless and impulsive… no I am” , Beth tries to keep her raw emotions in-check, but her final sentence is like a death knell to Rip's hopes and dreams. He can see the ghost of unshed tears well in the red-head’s eyes, as she gently wrestles herself out of the close embrace of the cowboy's arms "Rip, you need to stay clear of me, I always end up killing the things I love the most".

Rip couldn't bring himself to fully release his boss's daughter, he held her hand lightly, missing the proximity of his hug, wishing that they could stay together indefinitely but he knew he had to address her misconceptions immediately, even if she was too headstrong to believe him, he would lay down his own truth. "Beth, you are beautiful. You are brave. I have never seen you punch down, you only ever pick fights with people who deserve it" He stoped briefly as he heard Beth's sniffly sob, "You fight for the people you love, I think that is the highest love and loyalty. I want you to know, I love you". He cupped his hands gently to frame her face, "You’re like the sun, for me Beth, I will remain in your orbit as sure as night follows day, there is no one else for me, it has always been you. I'm humbled by your brilliance. You can try to hide in the shadows but you belong here, where you shine brightest and if you'll have me I'd like you to bring your warmth and light to my life." Rip figured this might be the longest sentence he had ever strung together, but he knew Beth's bullshit detector was the best in the business, so he had to keep his words real. "Beth, you mightn't want me and that's ok. I just want you to know you have me, always have, always will darlin'. I'll be here when you are ready". Once he finished his speech he let Beth re-initiate the hug, a baby step but it was worth the wait for Rip, he was after all a patient man who understood the value of his heart's fondest dreams.


	2. Chapter 2

Beth paced around her father’s house wondering when it had stopped feeling like her home. Lee’s untimely demise was a focal point of these uneasy emotions, but definitely not its geneses, the root of these unwanted emotions lay somewhere deeper. In the dining room, she stopped briefly at Lee’s empty chair, the whirlwind of this week meant she hadn’t really processed her brother’s death, it was so recent, tragic and raw. She could still see the indentation of his large frame imprinted on the chair’s cushion. Her mother’s position at the head of the table still proved too difficult to dwell on, despite the long intervening years since her death, she could remember the tears she shed weeks after her mother’s death when the lingering wisps of her perfume no longer brightened this room. Her realisation on that long lost day, was that she’d been cast adrift in a sea of musky man scents, her father, her brothers. Her loneliness as the solitary female island in a continent of no-nonsense ranchers and surly cowboys was something she internalised completely. 

She sat forelornly on her own seat at the long table. She longed to self-regulate her feelings with a long stiff drink, too tired and emotionally drained to work through her maelstrom of emotions. Kayce’s chair was empty, but this wasn’t a source of sadness. He had a wife and a kid now, he had managed to pull himself out of the toxic orbit of her father’s machinations for his ranch. Beth understood the irony as she sat at her place at the table, at her father’s right side. It wasn’t lost on her that she was left here in purgatory with Jamie to do her father’s bidding. In a perverse-way it felt fitting that she could count herself among the worst Duttons still here, still ready and willing to do her father’s bidding. The admiring terms her father used to describe her ability to do ‘evil’, was a metaphorical gut punch to her psyche. She took no pride or joy in the things her father asked her do, it chipped away at the meagre reserves of self-respect that she couldn’t spare. 

In many ways the fact she choose to go along with John Dutton’s instructions, was an open rebuke whenever she tried to temper the worst excesses of her own actions, her own usefulness to her father was bound up in an ability to destroy other lives. A talent that drove her to drink and a necessity to protect the people she cared about by keeping them away from all this bullcrap, stop them from getting too close to her emotional core. She struggled to remember a time when she wasn’t her father’s attack dog, allowed to run feral, starved of love and understanding to the point where they each seemed like foreign concepts. She shook her head a little at the thought that she… Beth Dutton, bitch par excellence, could feel so mushy and maudlin. Self-pity was something that worthier people deserved. Alcohol would be the answer to the question no one asked.

She needed a stiff drink, something to quell the turmoil roiling in her mind. She eschewed her father’s study, despite its generously stocked bar, she couldn’t face her father or his female visitor. She’d drive herself to the convenience store and grab some bottles. It made sense that she would need her own independent supply, especially as she had consented to stay until her father’s feud with the reservation was resolved. She gathered herself slowly now running on autopilot.

The fresh air assaulted her senses, cool and bracing as only nighttime in pristine countryside could manage. She could see the lights of the bunkhouse providing the only counterbalance to the night’s inky darkness, if she strained her hearing she could make out happy voices of the bunkhouse, their boisterous chatting only punctuated by mirth and laughter, the found-family of a bunch of loner cowboys knitted more tightly in camaraderie than her own sadly fractured family. 

She fumbled in the dark to guide car keys to unlock her car, grumbling as she surveyed the mess she had left her car in this week. Organising the funeral service, the catering, Lee’s suit had been her only animating thoughts. She was glad to have something concrete to work on even if it felt like she had run multiple laps of the State, fixing and managing every element of the ceremony. The chaos in her car stood as a testament to her stressful and draining week to date, suddenly her emotional vulnerability made sense, it must be a by-product of this terrible week, sleep deprived and overwrought with saddness, suddenly her desire for a drink evaporated. 

She wasn’t sure how long she stayed there in the silence of her car, the secondhand comfort of the contented hustle and bustle in the bunkhouse was still drifting out in the night air. It was like a comforting lullaby to her tired mind. No politicking, no drama, no ulterior motives. It was too late to drive off when she saw the small party of cowboys headed out to collect their tack and horses, their airrifles slung on shoulders casually. She had been divorced from ranch-life for so long she clean forgot about the periodic need to chase away wolves or other nighttime predators that might endanger the livestock. She knew the ranch hands were all cowed by the power of her last name, this was proved by the fact only a handful of cowboys managed a longer greeting than a tipped hat salute, but she knew Rip was going to be different. Rip was always the exception.

Rip had a quiet word with Lloyd, instructing the older cowboy, to take the wolfing party on a mission to the farthest recesses of the Dutton property. The new kid, Jimmy barely capable of riding could bring up supplies with Colby in the ATV. Tonight he figured his higher calling was Beth. He had hardly seen her all week, noting her car was often gone, before he started to tackle the morning jobs on the ranch and even more frequently the car was still missing when he did his nightly patrol of the stables before he went to sleep. His suspicions were confirmed when he drew level with the car, she looked the epitome of tiredness. Her lethargy highlighted when she had no snarky comment when he opened the passenger side door. He moved a week’s worth of pre-packaged salads and sandwiches from his seat into the backseats of her car. He mentally noted that he’d get Ryan to drop the car off to be valeted over the weekend, giving her one less thing to worry about. 

He reached for her hand still hovering over the ignition, he was relieved that her body didn’t tense while his hands enveloped her smaller one, taking the keys when she offered no move to stop him. In such close proximity Rip could see her struggle against her own tiredness, the bags under her eyes were highlighted by the pallor of her skin, he could see the evidence of several missed meals now thrown carelessly behind them. He gathered her gently into his arm, she was painfully light and was easily cradled by his broad frame. He was careful not to jostle her half-sleeping form, he watched her struggle to keep her heavy lids open. Her whispered protests not to take her back to the main house, left Rip with pitifully few options, but he knew he made the right call when she shared a weary smile with him as they crossed over the threshold of the bunkhouse.

He placed her carefully on his hard single bed, its location at the far corner of the bunkhouse gave them the illusion of privacy. He thanked his lucky stars that he had banished the house's occupants to a hard night of wolf hunting. If they found any animals they’d need to sedate them and wait for wildlife rangers to move them to the Yellowstone nature reserve, they realistically wouldn't be back until mid-day tomorrow. He watched Beth open her eyes slowly to fully take in her surrounding, the seductive call of sleep seemed to blunt any inclination the red-head might have ordinarily decided to argue on. “Stay, there rest. I’ll rustle you up something to eat”, he softly draped his blanket over her resting form.

Beth’s exhaustion meant she had only processed Rip’s words once he had left to make something to eat. His spartan single bed was an oasis of calmness, her tired body rebelled against her traitorous mind’s desire to punish herself with the lonely alternative of a bottle of whisky in her room. The bed smelt like Rip, a safe smell from her childhood, that same musty sweaty mix from when his bedroom was a bundle of hay in a spare stall in the stables. She sweeps her eyes over Rip’s domain, feeling cocooned by Rip’s presence, his bed, his blankets, his humming as he clattered around in the barebones kitchen. The second time she closes her eyes, she forgets to open them, her body succumbing to the oblivion of sleep.

Rip snuck a peak at Beth’s slumbering form, she looked so peaceful he was loath to wake her. Her hair haloed her serene face. He felt the familiar protective feelings that he always kept close to his chest. He pulled up a nearby chair so that he could watch her as she slept. He was surprised when she gave him a tired smile, her eyes still heavy lidded, her mind somewhere between the twilight of wakefulness and sleep. He watched her struggle upwards to a seated position, her hair adorably sleep tousled, her movements fatigued. He placed his hand on her shoulder, hoping the soft pressure would induce her to lie back down. “Hey, hey darlin’, its okay, how ‘bout you get some more sleep”. Beth can only manage a blink, her body pleading with her to relent and get some much needed respite. She tried to create some space on the hard bed to share with Rip, but her limbs were proving too stubborn to move. Rip watched while the slumbering woman’s breath evened out. He found an extra blanket to drape over her resting body, before he could relax more fully himself. The beans on toast lay untouched on the table, he mentally planned for breakfast in bed tomorrow. He’d gladly risk John Dutton’s ire, as he planned to carry his daughter bridal style to her more comfortable bedroom once he was fully satisfied that his charge was fed and better rested. He had bought them time tonight but he didn’t think the Bunkhouse in the morning would be conducive to Beth’s continued recovery. Among Rip’s admirable qualities was his practicality. He would wait patiently now bidding his time until the morning, he was resigned to the fact that he needed to show his understanding, careful not to spook Beth. She was slow to trust but tonight she had let him take care of her, he was happy to step up to the plate and lay the foundations for a steady relationship, one slow step at a time.


End file.
